Thursday, June 12, 2008

Will we ever catch a break??

No pun intended. Sam broke his arm - it is a level one growth plate wrist fracture, to be exact. Prognosis is great and he will spend the next 3 weeks in a cast. If all goes well, that is all the treatment that he will need. I have no idea how it happened - there was no catastrophic event, no big fall with lots of tears....... He told me on Monday that he had a boo boo. I kissed it and asked him if it felt better, he said yes and continued to play. This is an event that happens several times a day everyday (sometimes it happens following someone elses boo boo just because we like the attention) so it was no cause for alarm. Sam woke up Tuesday morning, very quiet and holding his arm. He said "ow" and held it up to me. It was swollen at the wrist up through the elbow. We called the advice nurse to get an appointment and she wanted to know what Sam says happened - then we have to explain that although he is 3, he is still developing the language, learning English and overcoming the fistula that has formed in his palate..... So we have no idea. She gave us a work-in appointment for the morning (code for Long Wait) so that I would not have to take all the kids to the appointment - Jack and Robbie are in VBS this week. I arrange with a neighbor to get them to VBS, and head off to the doctor. Our pediatrician referred us to a pediatric orthopedist. Sam was so brave. I know he has got to be so confused about all of the things happening to him. Ironically, we had a visit with the Craniofacial team last week and they told us to take the summer off. Dr. Thomas said that with the volume of his caseload, it was not a good thing that he could recognize me and did not even need to look at Sam's chart - it meant that we had been up there way too much recently. He said to take a break and enjoy the summer and come back in September and we would make a plan for the future. Now not even a week later we are facing medical issues again. It's funny. But on the bright side, we have more time for the orthopedist now that we are no longer traveling back and forth to Sc*ttish Rite.

Therapeutic touch works wonders. Can be learned easily. Fractures heal in half the time....if you believe in witchcraft. I do, and I practice it regularly on my patients. Well, mostly to keep em quiet,but it does work. Google it.